praetarius5018

Final Fantasy 5: the brainstorming

121 posts in this topic

1) As said somewhere above, originally I wanted to remove MP altogether.
But that is kinda difficult if you have tiered spells. I mean sure, I could change it to Fire1 hits one target, Fire2 hits all with the multitarget penalty but what should Fire3 do then?
Or replace tier3 entirely, that'd work too.
Or scratch Fire2 AND 3, then keep Fire"1" as toggleable single/multitarget.
Ok, there probably aren't that many staples in the series we're missing AND can recreate.
Plus, certain classes would become overpowered just on the basis of sheer choices.
A Black Mage with 18 answers per problem instead of 5 would be terrifying.

And how'd you balance Fire1 against Fight AND X-Fight at the same time..
problems, problems..

And what to do with MP damage/stealing/regenating effects then.

3) This would just be a name change then.
I don't think that is really necessary when magic is so freely available that you can file it under "a mage was bored between battles".

4) Overall it increases the complexity of choice together with element changes.
Every item modifies elemental weakness and strength so on the open sea where water will be more present you'd rather not take fire items unless the side effects are really, really good.

5) "Many elements" is imo only a problem when ways to inflcit damage of that type barely exists.
At the moment I only recall one way outside of Gaia (I exclude it because of region lock) to inflict poison (Bio) and water damage (Leviatan; Aqua Rake is non-elemental).

6) Don't give me ideas.
Else I remember what the lowest difficulty was you used and then deny the final battle on difficulty 4 or easier.
And on a pure difficulty 1 playthrough you get a third phase on the final boss.

7) BD had the most hilarious version honestly.
By default you could turn encounters off or increase it up to almost every step.
BUT!
If you grind your starting class a whole lot you get "enemy lure" ability which increases the encounter rate as well.
Pointless.

Overall I don't have much problem with random encounters themselves.

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1)  Ah, I was referring to what you're already doing (with having MP start at 0, etc.) as "scrapping" the system, so I was just saying I support that idea.  The SNES era FF MP system just strikes me of a brainless copycat of Dragon Quest's MP system.  Except in Dragon Quest games you have very limited inventories, sparse if any methods of restoring MP in a dungeon, and a significant focus on dungeon attrition, and these factors make that MP system work decently.  But in FF, with virtually limitless inventories, many MP restoring items, and less of a focus on dungeon attrition:  it just feels pointless.

5)  Sparse usage of the many elements is a frequent problem, yes.  But I would say that another frequent problem is when having so many elements makes it take too long to identify enemy weaknesses/strengths such that you don't discover them until the dungeon is basically over (or don't bother trying in the first place).  Showing the enemy element types addresses that issue, though.

6)  Hey it's not my fault if you carry an idea to its extreme!  :P  I just like for being at the end of a game on "Hard" mode to serve as a testament to a Hard mode run that has occurred.  Rather than being some dial you could have turned up or down at any time.

7)  Well, I was only suggesting that unaugmented random encounter systems are problematic (in terms of appeal).  Examples of augments would be the BD thing or even something with minimal impact like the SMT/EO encounter radar (of green -> yellow -> red).  This isn't terribly relevant to a hack, though.  If the original game had no augments, no one is going to bat an eye if the hack doesn't either.  I only mentioned it because you're already looking to apply an augment, and I think it'll make for a nice bonus feature.

 

4)  So basically I was referring to the shift from "typed" slots (head/body/shield/etc) to untyped (all accessories).  I see both as equally viable, so I guess you could call this playing devil's advocate, but I wanted to point out the benefits of a typed system.  I dunno if you've played Fire Emblem Awakening or Fates, but in those games you can have your player characters marry and produce an offspring based on the parents.  However, each char can only marry one other char.  Because of this, when you have characters marry, you have to carefully consider all the other possible marriages you're giving up as a result.  If you could marry anyone freely, you'd have a lot more options to choose from, but the depth of the decision becomes a lot shallower, because you don't have so many opportunity costs to consider.  You'd just choose the most desirable partner in each individual case.

Similarly, with typed EQ slots, when you equip a helmet you're both deciding on that helmet and deciding against every other helmet.  This means you have to consider what kinds of benefits can be gotten from helmets vs. what kinds of benefits can be gotten from other types of EQ, and decide not only if this is the right choice to make for an EQ slot, but also if it's the right choice to make for the helmet slot, specifically.  So, compared to untyped slots, you have fewer build total options to consider, but the process of considering them is more complex.

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1) Yeah I know; with certain other changes I made the normal MP system would be even more pointless:
minimal encounter rate to run back and forth between inn and dungeon almost unhindered and infinite ethers say hi.

5) To be fair, the Blue Mage teaches an ability to scan for elemental weaknesses.
And it just costs 10 ABP which is almost nothing compared to what you get over the entire game (2500+?).
Sidenote: in this hack you'll have it from the start and it'll use no turn - afterall it only gives the solution to a visible "math" problem of what does element1 + element2 have as a weakness.

6) Just look at SD3SOM, I rarely do things in moderation >.>

4) There are several items that are one of a kind, so to an extend the same sentiment still applies. It just extends the options for classes that are usually worse off.
And it is kinda required because I otherwise have not many options to give several items per element in each slot.
The game can only have a max of 95 defense items, spread over shield, helm, armor and accessoires.
Here now thanks to element changes also spread over 8 elements.
Also availability is a problem. I can hardly have 12 defense items before the first boss just to cover the basics (3 elements per item category).

I stand by my decision here.

I haven't played either game but I could imagine that a straight forward step by step choice in that system would lead to a seemingly good couple wise pairing of
char a1 marries a2, b1 marries b2, etc.
while a more optimal setup for the whole team would have
a1 marries a2, b1 marries c2, c1 marries b1
maybe because b2 is only 1% better than c2 for b1 but b2 is 80% better for c1 than c2

err what was that about again?...

 

hmmm ... would I break any "sacred FF rule" by NOT having tiered magic? Or cutting X-Fight to 3 hits instead of 4?

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6 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

I can hardly have 12 defense items before the first boss just to cover the basics (3 elements per item category).

How many defense items does it take to cover the basics with untyped slots?

6 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

while a more optimal setup for the whole team would have
a1 marries a2, b1 marries c2, c1 marries b1
maybe because b2 is only 1% better than c2 for b1 but b2 is 80% better for c1 than c2

Yeah you pretty much got it.  And it's a maddening web of inheriting classes, skills, stat growths, and stat caps, along with each resulting child also being unique and having their own classes/skills/growths/caps to consider.  Combine the complications of gender, the fact that some character matchups won't mate regardless of circumstance, and an understandable refusal to engage in incest, and you get a maddening web of optimization that hasn't really been untangled yet even though the game has been out for over a year.

6 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

hmmm ... would I break any "sacred FF rule" by NOT having tiered magic? Or cutting X-Fight to 3 hits instead of 4?

Tiered magic is semi-sacred.  But then I've seen Chrono Trigger hacks that rename Luminaire to Holy and Dark Matter to Ultima, so apparently nothing is sacred.

X-Fight I don't think is sacred at all.  If anything, it sounds like it'd only hit twice.  Though you may as well just nerf it's power instead of its hit count so it can keep its flair?  Bonus points if the hits have more difficulty getting through high defenses.

Edited by zombero

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3 hours ago, zombero said:

How many defense items does it take to cover the basics with untyped slots?

Without counting shields 1/3 of what typed needs. And 3-4 elements in the first area should cover everything needed.

 

3 hours ago, zombero said:

X-Fight I don't think is sacred at all.  If anything, it sounds like it'd only hit twice.  Though you may as well just nerf it's power instead of its hit count so it can keep its flair?  Bonus points if the hits have more difficulty getting through high defenses.

I can change:

  • hit count 1-4 (5+ will crash the game if dual wielded)
  • defense ignoring or not; vanilla had that set, my version has not anymore
  • evade ignoring or not; vanilla used this as well
  • 1/2, normal or double attack power (value before defense); this one has normal
  • 1/2, normal or double damage (value after defense); this one uses 1/2

I already have a "X-Fight" clone that hits twice with half attack and double damage; so it has a much harder time against defense but at best deals double damage total compared to Fight.
So the idea was to make X-Fight hit 3 times with half damage making it always 150% of Fight but either above or below the clone depending on defense.

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5 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

Without counting shields 1/3 of what typed needs. And 3-4 elements in the first area should cover everything needed.

Gotcha.  Well, with the limited total item quantity and proposed element system:  I can see why untyped slots would be highly desirable.  I'm currently deciding how many typed and untyped slots to include in a system, so the tangent was relevant to my own interests.

5 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

So the idea was to make X-Fight hit 3 times with half damage making it always 150% of Fight but either above or below the clone depending on defense.

Sounds like the best choice from the options you listed.  Though some of what you're proposing for this hack (and some of what it appears you've done for SD3) seem like ASM hacks of a level that would make circumventing these restrictions trivial?  Unless it's all being done with rather clever data manipulations.

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3 hours ago, zombero said:

Gotcha.  Well, with the limited total item quantity and proposed element system:  I can see why untyped slots would be highly desirable.  I'm currently deciding how many typed and untyped slots to include in a system, so the tangent was relevant to my own interests.

In doubt, 3 is always a good starting number.

3 hours ago, zombero said:

Sounds like the best choice from the options you listed.  Though some of what you're proposing for this hack (and some of what it appears you've done for SD3) seem like ASM hacks of a level that would make circumventing these restrictions trivial?  Unless it's all being done with rather clever data manipulations.

Well, yes, asm edits are always involved.
The thing with X-Fight is that it is a multilayered problem actually.
X-Fight itself only calls the weapons attack several times with additional flags.
Certain weapons use magic damage formulas which ignore those flags, like the HP-stealing Blood Sword or most Rods.

...

You know, yes, I should just remove the half damage flag from X-Fight and add a hardcoded check at the end of the damage application that checks for the ability being used to being X-Fight and then modify damage there.
That'd solve so many problems at once.

Also X-Fight is so slow, especially with dual wield. That makes me like 3 hits instead of 4 even more.
Queue 2 dual wielding characters with X-Fight and you can make and eat breakfast before it is done.

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I have a big suggestion when it comes to abilities.

It's great that each class, like Mime, would have the ability to equip more abilities.  However, one thing that has always irritated me about FFV is that every ability is weighted the same.  For example, Black Magic or Dual Wield is weighted the same as See Hidden Passages?  Really?  Why would I ever burn an ability slot on Auto-Shell unless I had no other option?

There's a couple of solutions for this, and both very likely involve some pretty huge hacks.

1.  Make it so the characters have a ton of ability slots, like 6 per class, and make it so each ability consumes 1-3 slots.  Then, you can assign a weight to each ability.  This is kinda like the system in Final Fantasy Dimensions.

2.  Make it so the abilities are given a type, kinda like in Final Fantasy Tactics; so there are counter abilities, support abilities, etc.

I feel that this would create a lot more in terms of customization, and would provide a great opportunity to balance all or most abilities; and not just have many of them be throwaways.

Also, I would make it a design goal to make the Mime and Freelancer classes more niche classes.  It would really be cool to have a system where you are heavily encouraged to choose actual classes for end-game, instead of us all having 4 mimes or 4 freelancers with our end-game party.

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5 hours ago, zeteginara said:

2.  Make it so the abilities are given a type, kinda like in Final Fantasy Tactics; so there are counter abilities, support abilities, etc.

Yeah, I've always thought FFV wanted to have a separate passive ability slot, at the very least.

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I can't add more slots but what I did was that in-battle passive abilities are replaced with certain active abilities, specifically with !Item, !Fight, !Brave (take two actions now, double delay until next turn), !Scan in that order whichever you don't have yet.

So if you put on your Thief:
!Steal (always set because of class)
Politics (passive that gives you 2x items on steal and from victory spoils)
Counter
Evade

you can in-battle select from:
!Steal
!Brave
!Fight
!Item

but still get the benefits from the 3 passive skills.

Innate abilities now count for all classes, not only for Mime and Freelancer.

As for knowing which are innate:

FF5innate.png

Plus Freelancer is not selectable once you have switched.
Well, in short every class is like the vanilla Mime.

I hope that answers that slightly.

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On 26.9.2017 at 4:05 PM, praetarius5018 said:

1) As said somewhere above, originally I wanted to remove MP altogether.
But that is kinda difficult if you have tiered spells. I mean sure, I could change it to Fire1 hits one target, Fire2 hits all with the multitarget penalty but what should Fire3 do then?
Or replace tier3 entirely, that'd work too.
Or scratch Fire2 AND 3, then keep Fire"1" as toggleable single/multitarget.
Ok, there probably aren't that many staples in the series we're missing AND can recreate.
Plus, certain classes would become overpowered just on the basis of sheer choices.
A Black Mage with 18 answers per problem instead of 5 would be terrifying.

not sure if I should corrected or have proven my point

 

new white spell list:

Spoiler

cure, restore some HP for one/all
dia (replaces scan), one/all holy damage
pure, cures poison, blind and paralyzation
mute, inflict silence
armor, half physical damage
mini, inflict or cure mini status
smite (replaces cure2), one lightning damage, pierces 50% defense like flare
life, revive with 1/16 HP
charm, inflict confuse/charm
image, block 2 physical hits
shell, half magic damage taken and greater chance to resist spells that don't auto-hit (e.g. status effects)
heal, removes status ailments that aren't death or doom
storm (replaces cure3), one/all wind damage (white had aero in some titles)
wall, reflect spells for a short period of time (about 2-3 turns)
fury, inflict berserk
ward (replaces life2), like golem but a bit weaker
holy, high single target holy elemental damage, pierces defense like flare
dispel, removes most buffs

 

new black spell list:

Spoiler

fire, one/all fire elemental damage
ice, one/all ice elemental damage
bolt, one/all lightning elemental damage
venom, can inflict poison
sleep, can inflcit sleep
toad, inflict/cure toad status
water, one/all water elemental damage
stun, can inflict paralyzation
dark, can inflict blind
drain, wind elemental HP steal
break, can inflict petrify (=death for monster)
bio, poison elemental damage vs one, inflicts HP leak
quake, earth/ground type hit all spell (ground = can't hit float/flying)
tempr, increase attack power of ally by +6, max +30 (affects thanks to scaling physical and magic damage)
curse, not yet implemented, aiming for target takes +50% damage on next hit and has 0 def for that hit
flare, high single target fire elemental damage, pierces defense (means halves defense)
doom, instant death if successful
psych, poison elemental MP steal

 

new blue spell list

Spoiler

condemn, 30 seconds (more like 2-3 turns now) until certain death; also "revive effects" cancels this state
roulette, tries to kill a random target
aqua rake, got water element (and keeps anti-desert for x4 damage), was previously only neutral + anti-desert
l5 doom, all enemies with level dividable by 5 die
l4 quarter, all enemies with level dividable by 4 take damage of 75% remaining HP
l2 old, all enemies with level dividable by 2 suffer old status
l3 flare, all enemies with level dividable by 3 get hit by "flare"
frog song, inflict/cure toad status
tiny song, inflict mini status
flash, inflict blind
time slip, inflict old + sleep
moon flute, inflict berserk
death claw, HP to 1 with paralyzation
aero, one/all wind elemental damage
L? holy (replaces aero2), casts "holy" on an enemies that are NOT affectable by L2, L3, L4 or L5
Snowstorm (replaces aero3), level based ice elemental damage against all enemies, can inflict blind
emission (flamethrower), single target fire damage
goblin punch, x4 multiplier instead of x8 against target of same level
dark shock, halves target level
guard off, halves target defense
crusher (replaces fusion), deal damage equal to target's missing HP
blast, damage, HP leak and paralyzation
vampire, steal HP equal to half HP lost
magic hammer, inflict MP damage
big guard, armor, shell and float
exploder, if used by a PLAYER, caster survives with 1 HP instead of 0, also double damage; monster get normal damage and die
????, deal damage equal to own lost HP
needles, 1000 damage if used by monster, x2 if used by player
white wind, only half current HP is used as heal power
missile, deal damage equal to 1/2 of target's current HP, +50% if weak to wind; usable versus boss at reduced power

 

new time spell list

Spoiler

bleed (replaces drag, the does nothing spell), low fire elemental damage + HP leak
slow, increase delay between turns by 50% (vanilla was +100%)
regen, heal HP in set interval
warp (replaces void), change row of ally
haste, reduce delay between turns by 33% (vanilla was -50%)
float, avoid "ground" type moves
demi, 50% damage normally, 75% if target is weak to wind, works against heavies but at reduced power
stop, inflict stop status
exit, escape from battle independant of flee chance (as long as possible at all); escape from dungeon
comet, got earth element and "random" damage is now random relative to weapon power and regular M instead of pure 50..200 and a constant M
G100 (replaces slow2), remove float/flying, reduces p.evade if above 15 by 25%
reset, start battle over as if it never happened
shift (replaces demi2), target ally gets to act now (atb = 0); basically trade own turn for ally's
??? (replaces hast2), not decided yet
old, target gradually loses stats; has minimum values compared to "naked" stats (without armor)
meteo, same damage change as comet; still hits 4 random targets (or same target 4 times)
flood (replaces quick), water damage to all enemies
xzone, instantly destroy target (means it works against undead as well)

 

new spellblade list

Spoiler

(unless otherwise noted, elemental buff affects are x2 damage against weakness with NO defense change; applying the buff does not consume a turn and works on most now weapons that aren't in reality casting spells instead of attacking, e.g. harps, blood sword,..)
fire, fire elemental weapon buff
ice, ice elemental weapon buff
bolt, lightning elemental weapon buff
venom, weapon buff that enables to inflict poison
mute, weapon buff that enables to inflict silence
sleep, weapon buff that enables to inflict sleep
water, water elemental weapon buff
hold, weapon buff that enables to inflict paralyzation
dark, weapon buff that enables to inflict blind
drain, weapon attacks try heal 1/4 damage; inverse on undead and if damage was absorbed
break, weapon buff that enables to inflict petrify
bio, poison elemental weapon buff
stone, earth type weapon damage
tempr, +20 attack, def -25% (nerfed vanilla flare blade)
wind, wind type weapon damage
holy, holy elemental weapon buff
flare, not sure what to do with that one, probably ignore all defense
psych, steal 10 MP per hit; reduced for dual wield and X-Fight

 

additional changes:
MP "damage" that exceeds current MP damages ATB (= longer delay until next turn)

The relevant element for most attacks will be shown in the top display (only one color for those though...)

FF5_holy_x8.png

can now rename character in first slot any time that menu is available (just via holding L or R while entering menu)

FF5_rename.png

FF5_rename2.png

doesn't affect "story" dialog yet, since those are hardcoded, only menus. maybe later.

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Looking forward to trying this. I've always thought FFV was the most forgettable of the SNES FF's, but based on what you've done with Sin of Mana, I'm down to try this one out too. The ideas are interesting and I will probably get my ass kicked, which is the whole point. Will be staying tuned. Cheers.

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Well, the influence from your SD3 experience is really obvious. I'm always for replacing resource management with active, consistent challenge and chances to actually use the tools I have.

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8 minutes ago, Valenhil said:

Well, the influence from your SD3 experience is really obvious.

oh, is it that obvious it will be a total trainwreck? :$

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If you also want a quicker win, a great idea for a patch would just be one that forces the Four Job Fiesta rules.  Not saying your patch/revamp wouldn't be better, but FJF is really, really fun.

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I guess I kinda have that already as an option.

Spoiler

Normal Mode:

  • similar to vanilla FF5
  • each character is restricted by which jobs they can use, e.g. Bartz can normally never be a Chemist
  • each character has access to a total of 15 jobs once the jobs are unlocked
  • each job is banned on at least one character
  • it is no longer possible to change back to Freelancer
  • wearing a Sage Stone unlocks ALL jobs on that character, even if not yet aquired
  • having 1 or more ABP in a banned job without an equipped Sage Stone makes the character suffer from incurable Old status


Single Mode:

  • comparable to FF1 / FJF
  • you get access to all jobs after the first boss
  • once a non-freelancer job is chosen for a character (gained 1 ABP in it), it cannot be changed anymore
  • exp gain is doubled, abp gain is halved (rounded up)
  • Single Mode is not accessible when a character has two or more jobs with at least 1 ABP each
  • changing from Single Mode to Normal Mode is always possible

FF5_class_lock.png

 

There's only a few major things stopping me from releasing a playable (unbalanced) beta alpha:

  • a grind of 300 enemy formations
  • a bug with x-fight + spellblade that kills the game
  • a title for the hack

 

If you want to read, this is my current change list:

Spoiler

general battle changes:

  • battle frequency is now dependant on the former battle speed setting; 6 - rare, 3 - vanilla rate, 1 - grind mode
  • challenge level can now be adjusted in the config: affects enemy damage, defense, HP and speed
  • ATB is now instantaneous
  • if MP is 100 or above the wait phase between turns can be skipped by using 100 MP
  • defending and guarding restore 100 MP
  • MP at battle start is set to 10 unless certain abilities are equipped or specific jobs were levelled
  • MP damage that exceeds current MP now gets added to ATB until next turn
  • near death is now 25% HP or less (instead of 12.5%), abilities like cover trigger accordingly
  • backrow modifier is now 75% instead of 50%


Stat changes:

  • strength reduces equipment burden
  • agility increases accuracy and evade
  • agility and magic partially bypass enemy magic evade
  • changed HP/MP progression
  • HP gain softcaps at Lv30, 1600 base HP compared to 2000 at Lv99
  • damage softcaps at Lv35
  • equipped skills add stat bonuses instead of increasing the minimum stat level
  • most abilities provide stat bonuses when equipped; passive abilities, especially innate ones, provide higher stats


Job changes, general:

  • choice between "Normal" and "Single" Mode in config, details below
  • required ABP for job up only depends on number of current total job level
  • stat influence of being in a certain job has been turned down
  • each Job level up grants stat bonuses to the character
  • each Job has now 7 levels
  • a character can at most have 70 job levels
  • all Jobs have one Job-related Slot plus 3 free slots
  • !Fight and !Item are optional
  • innate abilities are active for all jobs once unlocked
  • Caution, Preemptive, Berserk, Cover and Counter are no longer innate
  • Berserker is no longer auto-berserk
  • every job can equip every item


Job changes, Normal Mode:

  • similar to vanilla FF5
  • each character is restricted by which jobs they can use, e.g. Bartz can normally never be a Chemist
  • each character has access to a total of 15 jobs once the jobs are unlocked
  • each job is banned on at least one character
  • it is no longer possible to change back to Freelancer
  • wearing a Sage Stone unlocks ALL jobs on that character, even if not yet aquired
  • having 1 or more ABP in a banned job without an equipped Sage Stone makes the character suffer from incurable Old status


Job changes, Single Mode:

  • comparable to FF1
  • you get access to all jobs after the first boss
  • once a non-freelancer job is chosen for a character (gained 1 ABP in it), it cannot be changed anymore
  • exp gain is doubled, abp gain is halved (rounded up)
  • Single Mode is not accessible when a character has two or more jobs with at least 1 ABP each
  • changing from Single Mode to Normal Mode is always possible


Weapon changes:

  • Knives now properly use (STR+AGL)/2 instead of STR/2 + (high byte)(AGL/2)
  • Chicken Knife now uses (STR+AGL)/2 instead of STR+AGL
  • Chicken Knife now has 20 attack at 0 escapes and goes up by 2 per escape, caps at 90 attack power; for non-weapon purposes attack power is 0
  • BraveBlade starts at 100 attack and goes down by 1 per escape
  • BraveBlade loses attack for ALL purposes on escaping not only for regular attacks, e.g. also for Goblin Punch
  • Lances can be used with Double Grip
  • Rods and Staves now use (STR+MAG)/2 instead of STR; attack value is no longer random between 0 and 2x attack power
  • all weapons have now a base element, e.g. most swords deal fire damage, this stacks with the effect of spellblade
  • weapons that had a element in vanilla are still "auto-spellblade", meaning using a spellblade effect overwrites the special property
  • unarmed attack power increases by VIT/2
  • increased accuracy of Blood Sword from 25 to 65


Equip changes:

  • instead of helm, armor and relic you can now equip 3 relics
  • all pieces of equipment are elemental and contrbute to elemental strength and weaknesses of the character
  • relics add a mix of resistances and weaknesses
  • relics increase attack power of weapons and spells of matching element by +10% (additive with each other and character bonus)
  • if you are both weak and resistant to an element it becomes neutral
  • shields remove their listed element from weaknesses, this step applies after weakness and resistance wipe each other out
  • armors can now increase eva% instead of only shields, this stacks with AGL and is capped at 70%
  • armors can now also increase base HP (profits from VIT)


Item changes:

  • consumables like Potion, Ether, Antidote and mixing ingredients are no longer used up
  • their effectiveness increases with stack size, 1x Potion heals for 50 HP, 99x Potion heals 1250 HP
  • using !Item, !Mix, !Throw, !Drink puts those abilities on cooldown until it can be used again, stronger items require longer cooldown
  • Elixir, Phoenix Down and status removal items get shorter cooldowns with bigger stacks
  • breaking Rods does not give a cooldown and still destroys the weapon
  • when defending remaining cooldown gets reduced by 25%
  • added Bombs that deal constant damage to all enemies, power based on stack size


Element changes:

  • hitting a weakness now only reduces effective defense by 25% instead of ignoring it entirely
  • hitting a resistance now reduces atk power by 25% and increases effective defense by 50% (formerly was just -50% attack power)
  • hitting a immunity now reduces atk power by 50% and increases effective defense by 50% (formerly was auto-miss)
  • defending targets have no elemental weakness
  • each character has two elements for which they increase attack power of weapons and spells by +10% (additive with relic bonus)
  • Bartz empowers wind and lightning elemental attacks
  • Lenna empowers water and ice elemental attacks
  • Galuf empowers earth and holy elemental attacks
  • Faris empowers fire and poison elemental attacks


Ability changes:

  • spell abilities !White, !Black, !Red, !Time, !Summon are now only learned once and grant access to all their spells (if learned) like !Blue
  • in battle non-active skill slots are filled with non-duplicate !Item, !Fight, !Brave, !Scan
  • Barrier: triggers now at 1/4 instead of 1/16 (and only if shell is not already active)
  • Brawl: attack power bonus increases by 1 per level instead of 2 and caps at Lv35
  • Counter: chance increased from 50% to 70%
  • Counter: changed used ability from !Fight to !Counter; same modifiers for now but displays name on top
  • Defend/Guard: defend/guard stance is cancelled on free/extra turns (e.g. 100 MP use)
  • Defend/Guard: damage reduction now applies against all attacks that respect either physical defense or magic defense
  • Defend/Guard: negates elemental weakness, reduces chance to get hit by status effects
  • Defend: reduces damage only by 25% instead of 50%
  • Drink: items are no longer consumed but put the command in cooldown, bigger stacks give shorter cooldowns; cooldown shared with Item
  • Dual-Wield: now has a 13/16 attack power penalty
  • Double Grip: 125% attack power instead of 200% final damage
  • Drink: Power Drink now increases attack power by 10 instead of a dummy value, capped at +30
  • Equip X abilities were replaced with new abilities
  • Fight: successful hit regains 5 MP (3 if dual wielding), up to 80 MP
  • Gaia: random chance independant of level, roughly 25% chance for each local spell effect
  • GilToss: cost lowered to 10*VIT Gil per target
  • GilToss: base damage is 1.5*VIT+5 instead of based on level
  • GilToss: damage multiplier is based on level*(AGL+VIT)/2 instead of fixed 150
  • GilToss: uses earth element
  • Guard: take 1/4 damage instead of 0 from physical attacks
  • HP +10%: renamed to Bulwark, adds 10 VIT as well
  • HP +20%: renamed to Endure, HP +10%, can survive lethal hit if HP was > 1/8 before
  • Kick: takes unarmed base attack power now into account instead of only using the brawl bonus
  • Medicine: no longer affects MP recovery
  • Mix: items are no longer consumed but put the command in cooldown, bigger stacks give shorter cooldowns; cooldown shared with Item
  • MP +10%: renamed to Turbo MP, provides 10 MP at battle start
  • Observe/Scan: grant free turn afterwards
  • Red: grants White and Black magic up to level 4
  • Rose: formerly Red2, grants White and Black magic up to level 2
  • Slash: changed to hit-all physical 85 power STR/AGL attack with 75% base accuracy instead of kill all
  • Song: max stat bonus reduced to 30 instead of 99
  • Spellblade: grant free turn afterwards
  • Spellblade: now compatible with all non-spell weapon types (Bows yes, Rods yes, Blood Sword no)
  • Spellblade: no longer usable with X-Magic
  • Steal: chance to steal and chance for rare item increases with AGL
  • Throw: does no longer consume the item but gets a cooldown based on item used, e.g. Shuriken have faster cooldown, stronger weapons longer; cooldown shared with Item
  • X-Fight: no longer ignores defense or evasion
  • X-Fight: no longer lets magic weapons deal double the intended damage
  • X-Fight: reduced from 4 to 3 attacks, increased damage from 50% to 57%
  • X-Magic: only provides access to level 1 white/black spells by itself
  • X-Magic: spells cast via this suffer a 13/16 attack power penalty
  • X-Magic: can no longer use spellblade spells


New Abilities:

  • AreaCast: equip-passive that lessens multitarget penalty for damage and accuracy from spells as if spells were "always multitarget"
  • Brave: does not use the current turn and gain 100 MP = get to act twice now; delay until next turn is doubled
  • Crit Up: increases chance for critical hits and their damage on katana and bows; increases min and max damage of axes
  • Finesse: menu with 8 physical skills; work with spellblade, 2handed, dualwield and weapon's element
  • Heal Amp: increase power of heal magic by 50%
  • Martial: menu with 8 physical skills, 3 of those are shared with Finesse, same modifiers
  • MagicAmp: increase magic elemental damage, same as e.g. Ice Rod, not stacking with those items
  • MassCast: allows to multi-target certain otherwise single-target-only spells
  • Pierce: attacks ignore absorb, immunity, resistance to element
  • Politics: stealing gets you 2 copies of an item, double post battle reward
  • Revenge: receive 25 MP when taking attack damage; poison and other effects do not count for this
  • S-Jump: jump with double damage and longer air time
  • Steady MP: recover MP after each turn
  • TwinCut: perform two regular attacks with reduced attack power but increased multiplier
  • Y-Magic: "counterpart" to X-Magic; non-X-cast magic gets 25% attack power boost
  • Aero, Aid, Armor, Comet, Cure, Drain, Fury, IceSwd, Mute, Psych, Shell, Slow: cast spell of same name free of charge, single target only
  • Sleep: cast spell of same name free of charge, multi target possible
  • Sand: use enemy ability Quicksand free of charge, single target only
  • Quake: use enemy ability of same name free of charge, multi target only


Spell changes, general:

  • changed spell damage formula to include equipped weapon; this works as a % modifier of the spells' spell power
  • in case of dual wield, uses the stronger weapon
  • in case of double grip (ability known + free hand), 1/8 bonus is given
  • for BraveBlade the dimished attack value is used
  • "rod breaking" uses a value based on level instead
  • staves and rods grant an additional bonus to spell power
  • multitarget penalty was changed from -50% atk power to a M factor based on the number of enemies hit (100%, 65%, 45%, 36%, 29%, 25%, 23%, 20%)
  • formerly multitarget penalty free spells (not abilities) now are subject to a lesser multitarget penalty (100%, 82%, 60%, 49%, 43%, 38%, 35%, 33%)
  • likewise magic accuracy modifiers (mostly status spells, other auto-hit) were changed from 100%, 50%, ..., 50% to 100%, 71%, 60%, 53%, 47%, 44%, 41%, 38%
  • flare-type spells now only pierce 1/2 defense instead of 31/32
  • level based type spells use (80..150)% weapon damage as base instead of fixed 10..100
  • random type spells use (100% weapon damage + (0..40))*C/16 power instead of 50..200, with C as the original M multiplier
  • for random type spells M is now calculated the same as for normal spells
  • modified a few spell animations to make them multitarget compatible
  • revive effects cancel doomed state
  • extra damage against specific monster type spells now only get x4 damage instead of x8
  • magic accuracy was changed from Hit% + (attacker.Level - target.Level) to Hit% + (attacker.Mag - target.Vit)/4


Spell changes, specific:

  • Animal/Mysidian Rabbit: heals party slightly instead of doing nothing
  • Animal/Unicorn: no longer a full heal, changed to very strong heal with blind/poison removal
  • Black/Curse: replaces Bolt3, against next hit target has 0 defense and takes +50% damage
  • Black/Dark: replaces Lightning2, try to inflict blind to one enemy
  • Black/Drain: added wind element
  • Black/Psych: added poison element, capped at 50 MP
  • Black/Quake: replaces Fire3, earth/ground elemental damage to all enemies
  • Black/Stun: replaces Ice2, try to inflict paralyzation to one enemy
  • Black/Tempr: replaces Ice3, increases attack power by 6, capped at +30
  • Black/Water: replaces Fire2, water elemental damage to one/all enemies
  • Blue/Aqua Rake: added water element
  • Blue/Crusher: replaces Fusion, deals damage equal to target's max HP - current HP
  • Blue/Exploder: x2 damage and caster survives with 1 HP if used by player
  • Blue/Goblin Punch: damage bonus against same level target reduced from x8 to x4
  • Blue/Hammer: MP damage changed to 50%+20
  • Blue/L? Holy: replaces Aero2, use "Holy" against enemies whose level is NOT dividable by 2,3,4 or 5
  • Blue/Needles: x2 damage if used by player
  • Blue/Snowstorm: replaces Aero3, deals ice elemental level based damage against all enemies, can inflict blind
  • Blue/Vampire: drains by 50% caster HP instead of 100%
  • Blue/White Wind: heals by 50% caster HP instead of 100%
  • Mix/Dragon Shield: immunity to wind damage
  • Mix/Explosive: x2 damage and caster survives with 1 HP if used by player
  • Mix/Kiss of Blessing: berserk status now respects immunity
  • Mix/Resist Fire: absorb fire damage, become weak to water and wind
  • Mix/Resist Ice: absorb ice damage, become weak to fire and poison
  • Mix/Resist Thunder: absorb lightning damage, become weak to ice and earth
  • Spellblade: elemental enchants deal x2 damage on weakness hit and make no change to defense
  • Spellblade/Dark: replaces Fire2, attacks can inflict blindness
  • Spellblade/Drain: heals only 25% of damage dealt
  • Spellblade/Flare: ignores all defense and basic physical evasion, does not modify attack power
  • Spellblade/Hold: replaces Ice2, attacks can inflict paralyzation
  • Spellblade/Psych: drains 20 MP, less for dual wield and X-Fight
  • Spellblade/Stone: replaces Fire3, enchant with earth elemental damage
  • Spellblade/Tempr: replaces Ice3, ignores 25% defense and adds 20 attack
  • Spellblade/Water: replaces Fire2, enchant with water elemental damage
  • Spellblade/Wind: replaces Bolt3, enchant with wind elemental damage
  • Summon/Golem: lowered Earth Wall's HP from 1000 + (Level * 50)  to 200 + (Magic * 20)
  • Time/Bleed: replaces Drag, minor damage + HP leak
  • Time/Demi: damage doubles against wind weakness, halved against heavy types (instead of auto-miss)
  • Time/Echo: try to cast an offensive spell any enemy has recently used; on failure to find a usable spell uses Demi instead
  • Time/Flood: replaces Quick, water elemental damage to all enemies
  • Time/G100: replaces Slow2, removes float and reduces evasion
  • Time/Renew: replaces Haste2, reduces remaining item cooldown
  • Time/Shift: replaces Void, target gets to act now (ATB = ready)
  • White/Dia: replaces Scan, holy elemental damage to one/all enemies
  • White/Holy: now pierces defense like Flare
  • White/Pure: cures in addition to poison blind and paralyzation
  • White/Smite: replaces Cure2, lightning elemental damage to one enemy, pierces defense
  • White/Storm: replaces Cure3, wind elemental damage to one/all enemies
  • White/Ward: replaces Life2, negate physical damage (Golem effect)


New Spells:

  • Finesse/Martial: Cleave, stronger physical attack
  • Finesse/Martial: Rampage, physical attack that can hit all
  • Finesse/Martial: Fate Hit, random damage
  • Finesse: Weaken, inflict physical damage and lowers evasion stat directly
  • Finesse: Armor Break, inflict physical damage and lowers defense stats directly
  • Finesse: Venom Strike, inflict physical damage with additional chance to inflict poison
  • Finesse: Chill Out, inflict slow
  • Finesse: Sharpen, ignores 25% defense and adds 20 attack for weapon attacks
  • Martial: Salted Wounds, inflict physical damage, stronger against hurt targets
  • Martial: Danger, inflict damage equal to own lost HP against all
  • Martial: Tera Break, inflict very high physical damage
  • Martial: Aid, restore 50 MP to ally, profits from Medicine skill
  • Martial: Prepare, increase own level by 10


Status effects, general:

  • status effect chance is no longer: if immune then 0% else 100%
  • status effect chance now depends on affinity towards a relevant element (e.g. lightning for paralyzation), status resistance (now only 1/3 instead of 0%), attacker's magic, target's vitality and a few other minor factors
  • heavy-type enemies can now be affected by HP to 1, revive-kills-undead and doom effects, subject to magic accuracy/evasion
  • heavy-type enemies can now cure themselves from certain status effects after some time: berserk, blind, charm, mini, mute, old, sleep, toad


Status effects, specific:

  • Charm: ends when taking any damage
  • Haste: delay between actions is now only reduced by 33% instead of 50%
  • HP leak: strength increased from 1 to maxHP/512 + 1, capped at 20, doubled if weak to fire, halved against player
  • HP leak: only ticks per ATB point, not 3~5 times per second
  • Level halved: against monster can no longer drop below half starting level
  • Old: stats drop only to 50% of base (=no equipment) stats instead of down to 1
  • Old: monster no longer lose levels instead now affects monster strength
  • Old: increased tick delay from 5 to 30
  • Poison: strength increased from maxHP/16 to (maxHP/16+20)*1.68 (roughly 10%), capped at 1000, doubled if weak to poison, halved against undead
  • Regen: strength changed from VIT*Level/16 to VIT*softcap(Level+5)/32 + 2 * (VIT - 22)
  • Sleep: ends when taking any damage
  • Slow: delay between actions now only increases by 50% instead of 100%


Monster changes:

  • potential max HP increased from 65.535 to 524.272
  • with very few exceptions enemies have always elemental affinities, no more 90% of enemy types are pure neutral
  • bosses and strong regular monsters can have "HP barriers", any overflow damage when reaching such a barrier is lost
  • e.g. a boss with a barrier at 5000 HP is sitting at 5001 HP and hit for 9999 damage, he'll only drop to 5000 HP now and only the next attack continues as normal
  • upon passing a HP barrier the following stats increase slightly: attack, STR, MAG, AGL, evade, m.evade
  • upon passing a HP barrier maxHP decreases accordingly, meaning the enemy can never be brought back above such a barrier
  • successfully inflicting a death, petrify or similar status will not kill a boss/monster with HP barrier directly, only drop it to the next HP barrier
  • enemies can no longer be immune to displaying their HP
  • enemies don't spend MP for spells
  • self-targetted revival for monsters fails after the first time; monster reviving other monster has no limit
  • stats, spell selection and drops were modified to fit with the other changes
  • all monster should now reward non-0 exp
  • strong fight is reduced from x8 attack power to x4
  • changed Gloom Widows color so it can be differentiated from Tarantula
  • monster like Omniscient should now treat !Gaia, !Animal, !Item, !Scan, etc. properly as non-physical


Monster formation changes:

  • enemy formations of random encounters are now more random; for most formations there's only 1/8 chance that it spawns with all members present.
  • if this 1/8 chance is not met, it is 50/50 for each monster (except the first) if it stays home.
  • boss formations and select few random encounter formations stay fixed
  • ABP gain is no longer determined by the base formation but a percentage of exp earned, capped at 200


Misc. changes:

  • can now save at any time
  • running on the world map no longer requires the ability
  • can rename lead character by pressing L or R + menu button
  • damage cap increased from 9999 to 32k
  • in-battle dialog can be forwarded by holding any A,B or direction button, previously these dialogs had fixed speed
  • same for cutscene auto-dialog
  • eva% cap has been reduced from 99 to 70
  • exp gain can be switched off in the config
  • exp gain is no longer divided by the amount of surviving party members
  • after battle, the party is healed by (1/8 maxHP + 4 * (VIT - 20)) * (VIT + 12) / 32
  • reequip after job/ability change can now be set to either optimize or none (keep current items)
  • changed menu attack display from 200% for dual wield and double grip to 13/16 and 5/4 respectively
  • "sort" now actually sorts items instead of only grouping them by consumable/weapon/armor
  • level from the likes of Hero Drink and Dragon Power mix is now capped at 239 instead of 255
  • escape via L/R either works or doesn't, no more RNG; success depends on encounter, AGL, deaths and a few status effects
  • "JOB Lv X ability" text on ability selection replaced with Active/Passive/Innate


Bug fixes:

  • damage should no longer be able to overflow
  • game no longer crashes when spells target 7 or 8 enemies at once, very few spells were not affected
  • attempting to hit the 8th enemy with a single target attack should no longer hit a "random" party member

 

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It sounds like your FJF style run is similar to a more FF1 like 'natural' run.

A true FJF unlocks only four jobs, but you can have all four characters eventually learn all four jobs.  While it's not quite as challenging as one job per character,  it does allow for some fun synergy.  Like a Mystic Knight with !Mug or !X-Fight for Chicken Knife awesomeness.  I really like that style of gameplay.

Would there be a way to have each crystal only unlock one job, chosen at random from the time the crystal shatters?

 

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Still my question: what would that gain?
Regular FF5 FJF works already and has many, many more variants than could be added in the ROM easily.
Plus I've 0 idea for GBA ASM so that'd lose 4 jobs from the pool.

And I sadly doubt anyone would ever go so far as to do a challenge run in any of my works.

Either way, the "easist" way to get an FJF mode for my mod would be an external generator that modifies a few specific values in the ROM according to "better" randomness than FF5 itself can manage.
The FF5 RNG can only have 256 different states. Needed would be at least 720 (6 wind jobs x 6 water jobs w/ mime x 5 fire jobs x 4 earth jobs).
So that obviously makes 2/3 of all combinations not possible.
Just imagine that this could possibly mean that 70% of teams are stuck with Berserker, glorious times!

hmmm.... shouldn't be too hard to port the needed change to a regular FF5, though would still need to write that "generator" - I've no idea how to do that.

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I was checking your comments about the wealth of elements and poverty in methods to use them. I don't especially mind that some elements are easier to use than others; that's a way to make certain spells more special. But I agree that it should be restricted to one or maybe two elements. No reason for water to be super-exotic, as you said. Would it be possible to make relics or other gear that changes attacks of one element to a related element? For example, your ice spells and attacks now deal water damage instead. Or your lightning attacks now deal wind damage. I said this with no clue how difficult it would be to code, so if it's not feasible I'll understand. I just wanted to throw the idea out there.

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That would be certainly possible to code.
Though at this point I'm not sure how usable or OP this would be.

Stuff like Meteo, GoblinPunch and BraveBlade/ChickenKnife are "balanced" around the idea that it can only be one fixed damage type.
Will have to think about this one, not sure.

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The idea wasn't exactly to make any element convertable to any other element, but I get what you mean. Didn't know about some spells being balanced around being one particular element. Maybe a better method for game flavor would be for some elements to be easier to access through weapons and others easier through attack spells. And you seem to be doing something along those lines already.

Edited by Regdren

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Everytime I write balance just imagine huge air quotes around it.
I just throw numbers at each other until shit stops working.

I sorta have such a split by necessity, I guess.

general rule:
Swords - fire
Knives - poison
Axes - earth
Katana - lightning
Lances - ice
Staves - holy
Bows - wind
Whips - wind but not many items
Rods - all over the place
Harps - technically no type since they use fraction spells
Bell - 3 water, 1 earth, yay?
unarmed - water (you know: blood, sweat, tears)
BraveBlade/ChickenKnife - water (fluid attack power)
Ragnarok - ONLY non-elemental weapon

considering which skills work with what weapon type and which not or which stats they use, each element is quite different.
and (current) max attack power varies as well:
fire tops out at 83, wind at 91, water at 100 (max braveblade)

then you have status effects that also belong to elements:
fire - berserk, HP leak
ice - stop, death
lightning - paralyse, old
water - toad, mini, doom
wind - confuse, slow
earth - sleep, petrify
poison - poison, zombie, HP to 1
holy - blind, mute, destroy

 

with that black may have access to all 8 elements but not equally;
e.g. its only holy type is a blind inflicting spell
for wind HP drain (better not try against undead)
and for ice well ice and death, etc.

white has fury/berserk for fire, nothing for ice, storm and charm for wind, etc.

Theoretically you just need fire, ice, lightning and wind to hit every single type weakness currently.
Most late game bosses have two elements, some regular enemies do too; those may have depending on combination 1-4 weaknesses (I extra checked that no combination results in 0 weaknesses).

If it was a fixed exchange like ice <-> water, poison <-> fire, etc. this would still be too much imo;
a too strong move would go from potentially being very good 25% of the time to 50%, have the right 2 and you're "done".
sorry, don't want that.

 

e.g. meteo is very problematic; it deals 4 hits to a random target though those may hit the same target, even for all 4 times if no other target is present, like in many boss fights.
it is insanely powerful if you can give it ideal circumstances - one target weak to earth, earth amp gear, mp to keep the spam going.
but that is also its drawback: if the boss resists earth it only/still deals above neutral damage in total - remember: 4 full power hits
I really didn't pay too much attention to what boss is weak to what elements and what that would mean, I just looked that I have something that fits and a good variance of types/weaknesses (e.g. the final boss's final form has unique weaknesses for each targetable part).
Meteo isn't alone, there are other insanely powerful moves - goblin punch, aqua rake, flare(s), echo, a dozen variants of "death", etc.
While they have a fixed type they are (almost) guaranteed to get their time to shine but (hopefully) not "solve" the game alone.
I'm not even sure how an element change on aqua rake could work, would it also change the anti-desert type? ouch..

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Maybe we could pull a page from the Adventurers comic and have Meteo stop working after enough casts. I mean there are only so many meteors in local outer space, right? I kid, I kid. Even though I'd love to see a game actually do that.

The point of bosses and other encounters being weak to innately powerful spells is definitely an issue. As you say, we don't want these encounters to be "solved" too easily. The only solution I can think of that wouldn't make such spells useless would be to give very powerful spells a cooldown similar to items under your new system. Then we'd need to worry a bit less about some of the things you mention. Granted, this might be less of a drawback in random encounters, but at least in that situation you'd still have to charge up the MP. That would give the random monster some time to do devious things before the Holy or Flare or Meteor or whatever else.

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